1. Field of Invention
The present invention belongs to a field of electrical connectors and relates to a memory protection device, and more particularly to a memory protection device against dust, loosening and oxidation provided above a memory connection base and a computer including the memory protection device.
2. Description of Related Arts
Computer crash, blue screen, a failure to start normally or a failure to enter the operating system after the start often occurs to a computer. Many reasons can cause that, but one main reason is the memory failure, including a memory corruption, an incompatibility and a failure in the connection between a memory connection base and a memory.
The incompatibility between the memory and the motherboard is caused by the memory and the motherboard and can be detected at the initial phase of the installment. It is easy to detect and solve the incompatibility.
The failure in the connection between the memory and the memory connection base is the most common memory failure in daily lives and also the factor leading to the highest maintenance cost.
A conventionally standardized memory connection base is shown in FIG. 1. The memory connection base has a memory slot 11, socket arms 12 provided at two sides of the memory slot 11, fastener arms 13 provided at two ends of the memory slot 11, hook fasteners 14 hinged with the fastener arms 13 for fixing a memory, pins 15 provided at a bottom of the memory connection base and crossing through the memory slot 11 and elastic reeds 16 (not shown in drawings) connected to the pins 15 and provided in perforated holes 121 of the socket arms 12, wherein heat emitting holes 122 are provided in upper ends of the socket arms 12.
A conventionally standardized memory bar is shown in FIG. 2. The memory 2 comprises a wiring board 21, memory granules 22 and electronic elements 23, wherein the memory granules 22 and the electronic elements 23 are welded on a side or two sides of the wiring board 21; two semi-circle bayonet connectors 211 are respectively provided at two ends of the wiring board 21; a plurality of connecting fingers 212 for contacting with the elastic reeds 16 are provided at a bottom of the two sides of the wiring board 21; a breach 213 for distinguishing a plugging direction of a memory is further provided at a bottom of the wiring board 21.
When the memory 2 is fully plugged into the memory slot 11, a front view of a connection structure of the memory 2 and the memory connection base 1 is shown in FIG. 3, wherein a “hook” 141 of the hook fastener 14 of the memory connection base and a lower end 2111 of the upper bayonet connector 211 at the two sides of the wiring board 21 are buckled with each other; a lower end of the wiring board 21 and a bottom 111 of the memory slot 11 contact with each other (marked with dotted lines). An upper end 2112 of the upper bayonet connector 211 at the two sides of the wiring board 21 further has a gap big enough to contain a “hook”. Even when the “ear-shaped” hook fastener 14 is pulled outwards, a moving track thereof does not take up too much space. And thus the “hook” 141 is provided in the gap.
The failure in the connection between the memory and the memory connection base may be caused by following reasons.
Firstly, dust comes into the memory slot of the memory connection base, which results in that the connecting fingers of the memory and the elastic reeds of the memory connection base are also attached with some dust. When the dust exists between the elastic reeds of the memory connection base and the connecting fingers of the memory, the electrical connecting performance of the memory and the memory connection base is changed so that a computer failure may occur. The memory connection base tends to have dust for the following reasons. On one hand, the memory connection base is very close to the CPU heat emitting fans. The rotation of the CPU heat emitting fans accelerates the air flow around the CPU connection base. With the increasing air flow volume, more dust brought by the air flow deposits around the memory. A great deal of dust exists between the memory connection base and the memory so that a poor contact or a short circuit may occur. On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 1, the plurality of heat emitting holes above the perforated hole which has electricity-conducting reeds of the memory connection base provided therein are open so that dust tends to enter between the memory slot and the memory through the plurality of heat emitting holes and the perforated holes, which leads to a poor contact or a short circuit between the memory and the memory connection base.
A Chinese patent of 200620083522 discloses a memory dustproof device provided at a side of a memory near CPU fans. As shown in FIG. 4 (marks thereof are irrelevant to the present invention), the memory dustproof device comprises a dustproof board (1) and a fastener (3). A turnup is provided at an upper edge of the dustproof board (1) and is stuck on an upper edge of the memory from top to bottom. A lower edge of the dustproof board (1) leans against a lateral of a memory slot (5) (a memory connection base of the present invention). Bulges (2) are provided at two ends of the dustproof board (1) and the U-shaped fastener (3) has fixing holes, wherein the bulges (2) are fastened with the fixing holes. A vertical slot is provided at an end part of the U-shaped fastener 3 which is stuck at two vertical edges at two ends of a memory bar (4). The memory dustproof device separates the memory with a dust accumulating region so as to effectively decrease dust attached to the memory and protect the memory.
However, the above dustproof structure has a disadvantage of inconvenience in installing. The lower edge of the dustproof board leans against an external side of a slot arm of the memory connection base, but many motherboards are initially designed without considering leaving certain space for a dustproof board beside the external side of the slot arm of the memory connection base. Thus a distance between electrical elements and the memory connection base is usually too short to allow an insertion of the dustproof board, which greatly limits an application of the above memory protecting structure and requires considering a thickness of a dustproof board before designing a circuit of the motherboard.
Moreover, the above memory dustproof structure functions with limitations. Since two fastener arms at the two ends of the memory connection base are not well sealed, when the CPU fans rotate to blow air, dust is still able to enter elastic reeds of the memory connection base and connecting fingers of the memory through the two fastener arms at the two ends of the memory connection base to cause a failure in the connection between the memory and the memory connection base.
Secondly, the memory is loosened, which leads to a poor contact between the connecting fingers of the memory and the pins of the memory connection base and a weakened electrical connecting performance to result in a disorder of the memory in processing the computer data and further a computer failure such as a computer crash, a blue screen or a restart. A main reason for a loosened memory is that a movement or a shake made by man loosens the connection between the memory and the memory connection base. Moreover, an unreasonable design of a rigid connection structure between the memory connection base and the memory also leads to a loosened memory.
A conventional fastening structure between the memory and the memory connection base is shown in FIG. 3, wherein an “ear fastener” and the memory are connected in a rigid structure; the memory and the bottom of the memory slot of the memory connection base are also connected in a rigid structure. Actually, a rigid connecting structure is hardly able to work as a real fastener. However, a soft or an elastic connection structure between the memory and the memory connection base is able to work as a real fastener so that the connection between the memory and the memory connection base is free from being loosened by shaking.
Thirdly, the connecting fingers of the memory are oxidized. The elastic reeds of the memory connection base and the connecting fingers of the memory are exposed in the air and plated with gold on the surfaces without full protection (such as spraying protective agents). After a long time, the surfaces thereof are gradually oxidized and the coatings of gold are also carved by multiple insertions and pulls to further accelerate the oxidation. When the connecting fingers or the elastic reeds are oxidized, electrical connecting performance is severely affected as well as the data communication so that the computer system works unstably and unreliably. Especially under unstandardized maintenance, dust of the connecting fingers is often wiped by hand. The sweat on hands is left on the connecting fingers when people are wiping off the dust of the connecting fingers by hands. The certain amount of salt and water in the sweat not only accelerates the oxidation of the connecting fingers, but also changes a conductivity between the connecting fingers and the reeds and weakens the electrical connecting performance so as to greatly reduce a working stability of the computer.
A Chinese patent of 200610146231.9 discloses a method of protecting connecting fingers and contacts of a slot (the connection base of the present invention, similarly hereinafter) thereof against salt spray corrosion and oxidation, which adopts a protective mask to cover the card slot or the memory slot as well as a card inserted therein and the connecting fingers of the memory to prevent the metal contacts from being oxidized and corroded by a salt moisture, a. wherein an elastic card protective mask is covering upon the card slot and an upper part of the card protective mask has a crack for the card connecting fingers to pass to be inserted in the card slot; b. wherein the memory connecting fingers are inserted in the memory slot and the memory and the memory slot are wholly covered by the elastic memory slot protective mask.
The above method is able to prevent the oxidation of the connecting fingers and the reeds which is caused by contacting with the air outside, but fails to prevent the memory from loosening. Besides, a design of covering the memory connection base with the protective mask is inappropriate for a memory slot having many electrical elements too close to the memory connection base and thus the protective mask may not be inserted in the space between the electrical elements and the memory connection base.
Furthermore, since the memory and the memory connection base are wholly covered by the protective mask, a dissipation of heat produced by charging the mutually contacting connecting fingers and the reeds is affected. If the protective mask is made of metal heat-conducting materials, the electrical performance of the memory can be affected after the protective mask contacts with the memory granules of the memory.
As a conclusion, the conventional arts fail to effectively protect the memory from dust, loosening and oxidation, especially fail to simultaneously protect the memory from dust, loosening and oxidation, so as to thoroughly prevent the electrical connecting performance between the memory and the memory connection base from affecting the stability of a computer system.